Virat-Dhoni Bond: Here is what Virat Kohli said to MS Dhoni

PUBLISHED ON:

Sun 03 Sep 2017

It was the 4th ODI between India and Shri Lanka on 31 Aug and India was leading the series with 4-0. The team got into huddle before the match start and the coach Ravi Shastri handed the India's ODI cap to Shardul Thakur for his debut match. All the team members gave a round of applaud for not only Shardul Thakur but also for Dhoni.

The Mahendra Singh Dhoni commonly known as MS Dhoni he was not always "The Mahendra Singh Dhoni" but was just a Mahi.

Tender Age

Mahi was born in Ranchi, Jharkhand on 7 July 1981. He studied at DAV Jawahar Vidya Mandir, Shyamali where he started playing badminton and football. He was really doing good in these sports and was selected at district and club level for the same.

Dhoni was a goalkeeper for his football team, Though had not played cricket but he sent to play cricket for a local cricket club because he impressed his football coach with his wicket-keeping skills and became the regular wicketkeeper at Commando cricket club (1995-1998). I think here of his journey of cricket started.

Early Career

In 1997/1998 season his performance in Vinoo Mankad Under-16 Championship was tremendously good and again he fascinated the selectors to picked for Bihar U-19 Squad.

On the basis of his improved batting and keeping performances, he got selected to the BiharRanji Trophy squad for the 1999/00 season. He made his debut against the Assam cricket team by scoring an unbeaten score of 68.

The things were not always in his court, he used to practice the matches during the examinations. Here is one of the funny incident of his life, when he was in 12th standard he needed to play cricket after the exam get finish so he asked his father and his father said :

India A Team

He scored his first century in the next season but was only able to score at an average of around 40 per game by the 2003 season. In 2003, he was selected to the India A team which went to tour Kenya to play a tri-series tournament with Pakistan A as the third team. In the series, he scored 362 runs at an average of 72.40 with back to back centuries against Pakistan.

ODI Career

With Dhoni making a mark in India A Team with his sterling performances in international tours and domestic competitions, he got a place in ODI squad for the tour to Bangladesh in 2004/05. Dhoni did not have a great start to his ODI Career, he has run out for a duck on his debut. In spite of average start against Bangladesh, he has picked for the ODI series against Pakistan and scored 148 off 123 balls to be called a match winning player in the Indian squad. With this performance, he had now recorded the highest score by an Indian wicket keeper as well as cemented his place in the side and here of the Dhoni era started.

In the 2007 World Cup, he could only score 29 runs in the 3 matches with two ducks which contributed to the knockout in the group stages. Again Dhoni bounced back with impressive performances which led him to be made the captain of the Indian T20 squad in September 2007. He immediately made an impact as he led the team to win the inaugural World Cup T20 in South Africa.

As a captain

He was made the captain of the Indian Cricket team for ICC T20 World Cup in 2007. He came back from South Africa with the trophy.

He was then made the permanent Captain of the Indian Cricket team for ODIs too. The very next year, he became the captain of the Test team too when he, as the then vice-captain had to take the reins against a test against Australia because Anil Kumble, who was the skipper then, was injured. Kumble declared his retirement after that series and Dhoni became the full-time test captain for India as well. It was with Him at the helm that Team India reached No 1 in the ICC Test Ratings.

Dhoni holds numerous captaincy records and under his captaincy, India won the 2007 ICC World Twenty20, the CB Series of 2007–08, the 2010 Asia Cup, the 2011 ICC Cricket World Cup and the 2013 ICC Champions Trophy. In the final of the 2011 World Cup, Dhoni scored 91 not out off 79 balls handing India the victory for which he was awarded the Man of the Match and many more wins he gave us.

He announced his retirement from Tests on 30 December 2014 and from ODI and T20 on 4 January 2017.

The current Indian captain Virat Kohli got emotional on the 300th ODI appearance of MS Dhoni and gifted him a Platinum Coated bat as a memento and guess how he described his journey Under Dhoni's captaincy?

Here are the exact words…

"What do I say. 90 percent of us started our career under you. It is an honor to give this memento to you. And you will always remain our captain".

As a MSDian I felt that he took Indian cricket to an advanced level and given so many things to cherish. Even his haters can’t pull themselves back to praise Dhoni. He earned an immense number of fan following only and only because of his coolness and calmness.

Final Note:

We all know Dhoni is an altruist who doesn't like to miss any opportunity to motivate his mates and the rising stars of Indian cricket. As an example after winning a trophy his first and foremost gesture is to hand-over the trophy to young lads.